A seat belt buckle devised to maximize holding capability as well as to improve the cost and ease of manufacture is disclosed in the U.S. Pat. No. 4,617,705 issued to James R. Anthony and Allan R. Lortz. The buckle includes a reinforcement plate mounted to and between an upper and lower housing containing a spring biased pawl engageable with a seat belt tongue. The pawl is held captive between the lower housing and the reinforcement plate, and is biased upwardly against the plate by a pair of springs. A push button is slidably mounted to the upper housing and has a pair of legs extending downwardly through the plate to contact and move the pawl downwardly to disengage the pawl from the tongue. An additional spring mounted between the push button and reinforcement plate requires force above a predetermined level to move the button downwardly to disengage the pawl from the tongue. In many cases, the seat belt tongue is split into two separate tongues for attachment respectively to a seat belt and a shoulder harness. In order to increase the fit and engagement between the buckle and the tongue or pair of tongues inserted into the buckle, we have further provided and disclose herein a pair of flanges extending outwardly from the reinforcement plate to engage and provide a stop means limiting motion including pivotal motion of the tongue(s).
False latching between a belt buckle and associated tongue must be avoided. In the case of a belt buckle engageable with a pair of tongues, the buckle must be designed so that it will not lockingly engage when only a single tongue is inserted into the buckle. We have therefore devised a belt buckle, disclosed in our U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,023,981 and 5,038,446, which will lockingly engage the tongues only when both tongues are fully inserted therein.
Our tongue ejectors include movable members biased outwardly toward the tongues by a pair of springs. In view of the number of movable parts in such an ejector arrangement, the assembly of buckles incorporating these ejectors has become time consuming and costly. As a result, we have devised and disclose herein an ejector module assembly which is easily assembled externally of the buckle and then insertable either manually or by machine into the buckle.